Aristedes
Aristedes is an arrogant bio-engineered Spider Soldier who helps Lydia, the ruthless leader of the Spider Alien armada, coordinate Orb Industries, a powerful international conglomerate. =Infernal Hierarchy= In preparation for their invasion of Earth the Spider Aliens, a race of blood-thirsty extraterrestrial arachnoids, established bases around the world hidden behind legitimate enterprises with agents strategically positioned within them. Aristedes, a leader of the alien network in charge of recovering the Manowar Class Armor, the most powerful weapon in the universe, from Aric Dacia, a 5th Century Visigoth lost in the modern age, went to any lengths to complete his mission. Deceiver As part of a plan to provide the Spider Aliens with limitless resources for their invasion of the Earth, Lydia seduced Harold Polk, the CEO and President of Orb Industries, and returned with him to New York City posing as his fiancé to impose herself in his life and usurp his power for their needs. After Lydia assassinated Harold’s business lieutenants, she replaced them with her agents, Aristedes and Prather, who assist her in coordinating Orb worldwide and in forming a powerful hierarchy for the Spider Alien network on Earth. At the New York headquarters of Orb Industries in the Chrysler Building, Lydia accused Ken Clarkson, a devious effeminate schemer, of embezzling the company and warned him that she had no choice but to deal with him very harshly. Unfazed, Ken believed that Orb Industries was a front for Communists or terrorists and threatened to report them to the federal authority, but then Lydia mockingly assured him that they were far worse than he could have ever imagined and unveiled her fangs for him to see. While Ken trembled, Lydia offered to spare his life in exchange for his services and then ordered Aristedes to put Ken on a plane to Peru and have their agents herd Aric Dacia, who stole their most powerful weapon, where he could intercept him. As Aristedes escorted Ken out, Lydia said that Aric had a very valuable ring that belonged to them, and told him that, after he had won his trust, he would bring the ring to her or die. Into The Fire On November 3rd 1991 in the headquarters of Orb Industries in the Chrysler Building, Lydia met with Aristedes and Prather to discuss their options following the disintegration of their fleet when Aric Dacia escaped with the Manowar Class armor. While Lydia believed that they were at risk, Prather believed that they still had options and refused to loose heart, while Aristedes noted that they were more than a fleet, and even cut off they were never prey and remained the predators. Although Lydia warned Aristedes not to lecture her over how much they had left, she regretted the loss of their lifeline. Assuring Lydia that all they needed was the Manowar armor, Prather informed her that it they had tracked it to Peru, and that while Aric had the ring, he could not have gone far. While Lydia worried that long as Aric had the ring he controlled the armor, Aristedes assured her that Aric had the brain of an ox and could not conceive of what the had. Sometime later in an Orb Industries’ warehouse in Massachusetts, Lydia met with Aristedes, who told her that Aric was making his way towards them. While Lydia was certain that Aric was travelling on foot and was a stupid barbarian, Aristedes worried that his trek would be long enough for him to learn more about the ring and that he had tasted power. When Aristedes told her that the armor would fight to be free long as Aric was in touch with it, Lydia agreed that they needed the ring as soon as possible and proposed a piece of treachery. Days later, while Spider Soldiers ambushed Aric and Ken on the tarmac of the John F. Kennedy International airport, in Massachusetts, the Manowar armor broke loose from the confinement beam that held it in place. As Lydia exclaimed that the armor should respond to their commands because they made it, Aristedes reminded her that they designed the armor to adapt to its user, and that he warned her that Aric had tasted power. In a sudden flash of light, the armor assumed a spherical shape and escaped through a window. Shortly, the armor arrived on the tarmac and kicked the debris away from Aric, and, as it wrapped itself around him like a bear skin, the soldiers fled in fear, while Malachai shot in the certainty that their weapons would destroy it. As Aric wished to jump away from the blast, the armor carried him towards the tank and he ripped its turret off its hinges, but then he found himself floating in mid air unable to move. When Malachai told Aric that watching him die would afford him great pleasure, Aric recognized his voice from the device on M’rrha’s hair and fired on the tank until it toppled on its back. Enraged, Aric pulled Malachai through the tank’s glass canopy and killed him to avenge M’rrha’s death. While tarmac workers discovered the damage from the battle, Aric escaped with Ken to the woods. Kingdom Come Later that evening, an Orb Industries helicopter landed in a warehouse in Northampton and, as Aristedes ran to welcome it, Lydia came out and asked him if he had done as she instructed him. As Aristedes informed Lydia that they began to work as soon as he received her message, he escorted her inside and showed her the assembled firepower he had gathered within the facility. Though Lydia applauded him, Aristedes doubted that all their weapons would be a match for the Manowar armor, but then she told him that all they had to do was momentarily stun Aric and hammer open the tiniest fissure through which to inject poison, and that if they stroke with massive force, they would conquer him. When Aristedes wondered how they would lure Aric into their trap and make him hold position until they could unleash the barrage, Lydia pointed at the image of Ken on a screen and told him that their former employee, who had become Aric’s ally, was their bait. When Aristedes informed Lydia that Aric was still in Long Island, she ordered him to send in their commandos. The next morning, Aristedes informed Lydia that Aric had destroyed their base in Northern New Jersey and was moving towards Pennsylvania. Worried that Aric was not going to Massachusetts, Lydia thought it was time they spoke with Ken. Moments later, in a red room where Ken was strapped to a web of tendrils that held him upside down from the roof and walls, he sarcastically told Lydia that Aric was less simple than either of them thought. As Lydia noted that luring Aric into an ambush was risky business, she asked Ken for any suggestions on how to catch him out of the armor and unawares, but he just told her to say her prayers. While Aristedes wanted to torture Ken, Lydia did not think that he knew anything useful and said she had an idea. Later that day, Aristedes and Lydia went over the records of the scout vessel that picked Aric up nearly twenty centuries earlier and kept him in stasis for most of that time. When Aristedes noted that Aric probably thought that only a few years had passed since his abduction, Lydia instructed him to find out what his world was like in his time and find out what it would take to make him think he had won. Using the information that Aristedes gathered, Lydia lured Aric to the Chrysler Building, where she and Prather posed as Emperor and Queen to offer him a token surrender so he would believe that he had won. As part of Lydia’s treachery, Aric killed Prather and took his scepter as his symbol of power, but when Lydia tried to poison him, she carelessly revealed her deceit and he stabbed her with her own blade. Injured, Lydia leapt out the window and vanished into the night, while Aric remained behind and took over Orb Industries for himself. Category: X-O Manowar Category: Characters